2. About the Name of the Aforesaid Penitence

a. About the Word ‘Penitence’ Equivocally Taken

57. About the second conclusion of this article [n.32], namely about the word ‘penitence’, I say that, just as in the case of the voluntary punishment [nn.49-55], it turns out there are many things to consider: First indeed, the will to punish, which is a commanding or efficacious will joining together the proximate causes of undergoing the punishment; second, the not willing to have sinned or to give displeasure, which is a proximate partial cause of the penalty, although the not willing not intend the penalty; and third, willing, that is, accepting, the undergoing of the punishment now inflicted; fourth, bearing the punishment patiently. And let these four be thus briefly expressed: to avenge what has been done; to detest what has been done; to accept the penalty inflicted; to bear patiently the penalty inflicted.

58. To these four correspond another four on the part of the term of the volition, wherein the material element is the same, namely ‘to punish’. And there are four superadded formal elements, namely what is willed by the will causing, what by the will detesting, what by the will accepting, what by the will patiently bearing.

59. Now it is plain that none of the aforesaid volitions is per se the same as the punishment undergone. And thus the name [sc. ‘penitence’], which per se signifies volition and connotes punishment, will not signify punishment univocally in connoting volition, and consequently, if any expression per se signify the punishment willed and the willing of the penalty, this will be done equivocally. Again, if it signify this fourfold volition, this will be done equivocally.

60. The same name, then, could be equivocally imposed on these eight elements.

b. About the Word ‘Penitence’ Taken Univocally or Properly

61. But putting the stress on the term ‘to be penitent’, since ‘to be penitent’ is ‘to hold a penalty’In Latin ‘to repent’ is ‘poenitere’, which here is made to derive from ‘poenam tenere’, or ‘to hold a penalty’. ⁷ (according to the etymology of the word), and since ‘to hold a penalty’ imports suffering with respect to the penalty (not just the suffering of it as it is presentSc. not just suffering the pain of punishment, which the impenitent can do, but suffering the fact that it is a ‘penalty’, something one deserves for a sin one now detests, which only the penitent can do. ⁸), the thing signified by this term seems to consists in four primary things.

62. And so there is a fourfold description of what it is ‘to be penitent’:

First is this: ‘To be penitent is to avenge a sin committed by oneself’. And it is plain how there it is ‘holding a penalty’, because to apply a penalty to oneself is to hold it; and it can be so understood whether one apply or inflict the penalty in fact or in affection, because he who avenges no less avenges even when the penalty, because of the defect of some second cause, not follow, provided however he himself have equal intention to inflict the penalty.

The second description of what it is ‘to be penitent’ is ‘to detest or hate a sin committed by oneself’ or ‘to have displeasure about this sin committed by oneself’. And it is plain how there it is ‘holding a penalty’, because holding it in a partial proximate cause. And this is understood of the willing-against or detesting or having displeasure about this sin in its proper idea, or in general at the same time about any sin committed by oneself - and again whether of formal or virtual displeasure. And virtual displeasure is any act of the will virtually including that displeasure, the way a cause in some way includes its effect even though the effect in itself not be caused; thus since every willing-against arises from some willing, all displeasure or willing-against of sin, although it not be present formally, can yet be present virtually in one’s will, on which will such displeasure is of a nature to follow.

The third description: ‘to be penitent is to accept gladly a punishment inflicted for sin committed’. And it is plain how here it is ‘holding a penalty’, in just the way an object is held by an act of will; and this can be understood of accepting formally or virtually, namely in some acceptation in which it is included virtually, just as willing a thing for an end is included in willing the end.

The fourth description: ‘to be penitent is to suffer patiently the punishment inflicted on oneself for one’s sin’. And it is plain how here it is ‘holding a penalty’, because it is not to cast off by murmuring back; hence too it is similarly said in this sense to be ‘to sustain’‘Sustinere’, a word derived from ‘tenere’ (like ‘poenitere’) and from ‘sub’ or ‘under’; hence to sustain is to hold oneself under something. ⁹, as if to keep oneself under the action of the agent, or of the one doing the inflicting, by conforming oneself to it.

63. All voluntary punishment is contained under one or other of the four modes of penitence. But, for the deletion of any actual mortal sin committed after baptism, some voluntary punishment is required; so for the deletion of it is required penitence stated in one or other of the four modes.